51: The Weird Bride's Unrequited Lover

“Hoo… hoo… hoo…”

In the gloomy alley, intense panting echoed.

The five members of the Joint Squad suddenly opened their eyes.

They found themselves still standing in the same spot.

But each of them was completely drenched in cold sweat.

The extreme mental exhaustion made it difficult for them to even stand.

They… had survived.

Outside the alley, there was no longer that despair-inducing darkness.

Daylight had broken.

A pale, cold ray of sunlight shone in from the alley entrance.

Five long shadows stretched across the ground.

The world, at this moment, seemed to have returned to normal.

They could hear the distant sounds of residents on the street, smiling and greeting each other.

And that light, yet somewhat eerie, background music.

The five exchanged glances, seeing in each other’s eyes the relief of having escaped a disaster and a deep sense of caution.

They stumbled out of the alley.

The sight before them instantly made them feel as if they had fallen into an ice cellar.

On the street, all the residents, still like programmed automatons, wore identical, lifeless smiles as they went about their daily activities.

And right across the street, in front of a breakfast stall, a figure in a white wedding dress sat quietly.

It was one of the “Crying Brides” they had seen last night.

But at this moment, she wasn’t crying, nor was she smiling.

There was no expression on her face.

Those hollow, numb eyes, as if filled with all the sorrow of the world, stared motionlessly at them.

The bride’s gaze was like two invisible ice picks, piercing deep into everyone’s soul.

On the surrounding streets, the residents’ faces still smiled, like bizarre masks, cold and comical.

The entire world was like a giant stage, and the five of them were ill-timed intruders into this perfect drama.

“Go back!” Gu Yanci’s voice was low and decisive.

In this state of unstable mental power, exposing themselves to the gaze of all the “actors” would undoubtedly be suicidal.

The five quickly retreated back into the gloomy alley, temporarily cutting off the suffocating gazes from the outside world.

“We must immediately clear our minds,” Gu Yanci leaned against the wall, forcing himself to calm down.

“The rules from last night might have changed during the day, or even become completely opposite.”

“Exactly,” Cang Xuan sat cross-legged, using his finger to quickly draw a few horizontal lines on the dusty ground, representing their known rules.

“First, the ‘Target Principle’ is absolutely wrong; it led us into a trap,” he pointed to one of the lines.

“This means the rules themselves are deceiving us.”

Ling Xi continued, “Secondly, the ‘Bride Principle.’ It says ‘do not look directly at the crying bride’ because they are safe. But now, the one outside is not crying, and she is actively ‘looking directly’ at us.”

“According to inverse reasoning, she is now extremely dangerous, or rather… she has transformed from a ‘background’ into the ‘event’ itself.”

“The most crucial is the ‘Smile Principle,’” Ye Liuli’s voice was hoarse with fatigue.

“This world doesn’t purify ‘those who don’t smile,’ but rather ‘those who harbor sadness.’ Smiling is merely a disguise.”

She paused, her words becoming heavy, “If we go out now, even if we are smiling, our hearts are filled with caution, vigilance, and even fear… will these emotions be judged as a form of ‘sadness’?”

This question silenced everyone.

It was a vicious cycle.

If they didn’t go out, the mission couldn’t progress.

If they did go out, there was a high possibility they would be instantly purified for being unable to produce a “heartfelt smile.”

They were like trapped beasts on a cliff, caught between a rock and a hard place… In the Sea of Concepts, Gu Jianghan “watched” this stalemate unfold on the live broadcast screen.

His materialized human body rested his chin on one hand, his fingertips gently tapping in the void, as if providing a perfectly timed drumbeat for this drama.

“Hmm… the logic is clear, and the deductions are mostly correct.”

“However, their thinking is constrained by their identity as ‘players.’”

“They’re always thinking about how to ‘conquer’ this NPC.”

“They’ve never considered why not try to… become a part of this drama?”

The smile on his lips deepened slightly.

“Oh well.”

“Excellent actors deserve a tiny bit of guidance.”

He didn’t use any earth-shattering power.

He merely blew a gentle breath into the void before him… In the alley, a gust of wind suddenly swirled up without warning.

The wind wasn’t strong, but it was just enough to lift a greasy piece of waste paper with a hamburger advertisement on it from the ground.

The waste paper spun in the air, as if guided by an invisible hand, and with a ‘thwack,’ it landed squarely on Gu Yanci’s face, who was at the very front.

“Huh?” Gu Yanci frowned, tearing the waste paper off.

Just as he was about to throw it away, his movement suddenly froze.

The others also noticed his abnormality and gathered around.

On the back of the greasy advertisement paper, someone had used what looked like a charred stick to leave black charcoal marks, writing a line of crooked, childlike Chinese characters:

She is not waiting for you.

These simple six characters, like a thunderbolt from the nine heavens, exploded in the minds of the five!

“She’s not… waiting for us?” Ling Xi’s pupils instantly constricted, then erupted with an unprecedented light.

“We were wrong! We were wrong from the very beginning!” she exclaimed, standing up excitedly, “She’s staring at us, not because we are ‘intruders’! But because… she is searching for a certain ‘shadow’ in us! The person she is waiting for is not us at all!”

“Mourning a lost lover…” Gu Yanci connected this phrase with the rules.

A thought so bold that it made his own heart pound emerged in his mind.

They weren’t meant to be “players” interacting with a mission objective.

They were meant to be “actors,” playing the role of the lover she would never wait for!

Once this point was understood, all previous dead ends instantly resolved themselves!

Why couldn’t one “harbor sadness”?

Because this world was “perfect,” Zhang Wei’s happy world.

Any sadness was a “flaw.”

Only one type of sadness was allowed: the bride’s sadness.

Because her sadness stemmed from her longing for her “lover.”

This “love” was one of the core rules of this world!

Therefore, the key to breaking the situation was not smiling, nor was it resistance.

It was… empathy!

Gu Yanci slowly stood up.

The fatigue in his eyes was swept away, replaced by an unprecedented resolve and sharpness.

He looked at the false sunlight outside the alley and said something to the four behind him that made their scalps tingle:

“One of us must go out and make her believe that he… is the person she is waiting for.”